LOUISVILLE, Ky. – Approximately 40 people attended the workshop “Restarting Ministry: What it takes to help a remnant congregation thrive,” held at the recent Big Tent meeting of the Presbyterian Church (USA).
Explaining how the workshop came to be, the Rev. Dr. Ann Philbrick, associate for Church Growth and Transformation for the PCUSA, told about a phone call she received from a pastor who was working with a group of people who decided to stay in the PCUSA after the majority of the congregation left to join another denomination.
“Are we a new church? Are we an existing church?” These were just two of his questions, and those were followed with “What do you do once you know?”
Philbrick warned that she would “not deliver a magic pill. It does not exist,” but she assure those gathered that the Church Growth and Transformation Office is committed “to resource all of you in the local congregation.”
She based her talk on the illustration of the typical life cycle of a congregation (Figure 1) calling it a “reality check. It’s where these groups need to start because they need a crystal clear vision of where they stand so they know where to go. … It helps congregations get a handle of where they are.”
Figure 1: Typical life cycle of a congregation.
She called the life cycle of a congregation a way in which the church family can “talk more honestly about where they are and the challenges they face.”
“Where you are in the life cycle has a big impact on what your options are,” she said.
The life cycle starts with a vision, Philbrick said. It could be one person or a few people with a vision of a dream about a connection to God that people in that community might need.
Then comes relationship – one person becomes two people, two become three. To move beyond the vision conversations must be held, relationships must be built within the community.
Philbrick said that program follows. She described program as “when you want to start doing things publically.” It includes who will preach, sing and where. Program is doing all the “work to execute the experience, but typically doing it with those with whom you have built relationship with,” she said.
The last item is structure, Philbrick said. That includes the organizational system, elders, deacons, the building, etc.
At the top of the life cycle curve, everything is in place and that is when what author John Maxwell describes as “destination disease” begins.
Philbrick said that once the congregation reaches the top of the curve – once the vision is fulfilled – the leaders get tired, bored or even complacent about the quality, energy and engagement of the congregation and its ministry.
That’s when the slide can begin, she said and usually the first thing to disappear is the vision. Either the vision wasn’t accomplished or the people got too busy and didn’t think about it anymore.
At that point, Philbrick said, if the congregation isn’t careful, relationships can crumble and the “blame game” can start. If the decline is steep enough, programs can be compromised, or even cut.
“The last thing left is structure,” she said. Speaking of the “amazing power of structure,” she said that even when the programs are gone, a session and a building still remain
PAULA KINCAID / THE LAYMAN
Ann Philbrick discusses the typical life cycle of a congregation at the Aug. 2 workshop.
Looking again at Figure 1, she said that the “incline” is the time in the life of the congregation when ministry capacity is expanding. It can also be the capacity of each individual in the congregation growing spiritually. “Ideally, both things are happening,” she said. During the time of incline the “focus is the future,” she said.
At the top of the figure is the period of “recline” when ministry capacity is not expanding anymore and the church is just trying to keep up. The focus here, she said, is the present and the church itself. The people are not looking beyond the church doors.
“The decline is when ministry capacity is shrinking,” Philbrick said and the major focus is the past and the “core” of the church.
She pointed to the lines of sustainability that are shown in Figure 1 which break the illustration into four quadrants.
So the question a remnant congregation must answer as it looks to the future is where is the church in this life cycle – before and after the split?
Philbrick said that most of the remnant congregations wind up in quad 1 or 4, depending on how sustainable they are and what their focus is.
Quad 1 is where new worshiping communities reside, and quad 4 is mostly churches with no sustainability. As an aside, Philbrick said that “80 percent of our congregations in the denomination are in quads 3 and 4.”
For the congregation that is left when the majority of the members leave the PCUSA for another denomination, they must ask what they are bringing to their reality now? Are they starting over as a new church?
Philbrick said that many remnant congregations “want the trapping of the existing church, but also want the money of a new church.”
They must ask themselves “are we ‘new’ or are we not,” and they need to be clear about that.
“Sometimes the best thing a remnant church can have is nothing,” she said, adding that a “building and money can kill you sometimes.”
She then discussed a list of things the remnant needed to consider:
- Building: “If you have a building, then you are not a new church,” Philbrick said. In her experience, remnants that have a building tend to focus on the building, instead of other things. “Maybe we need to teach churches that they don’t need that.”
- Location: The church remnant that is without a building must ask itself, where does it want to land? She said “Sometimes we ask ‘where is a building we like?’ instead of ‘where are we called to minister? … or what part of this community has a need?’” Remnant congregations must also decide if the building is an asset or not. She said that some churches have decided that they don’t want the building, only to find out no one else wants it either.
- Money: “How much money do they bring with them when the dust settles,” is another question that must be discussed. Philbrick said that one remnant congregation she worked with had nothing – no building, money or staff. “They had to start from scratch,” she said. In some situations, the remnant congregation leaves the building behind, but receives a buy-out from the majority that left the denomination. “They have money to do stuff,” she said.
- People, the congregation: “Thirty people can’t do as much as 100 people,” Philbrick said. “Be realistic about what you can take on.”
- People, the leadership: “What is the leadership capacity?” the congregation must ask itself. “Are we inheriting leaders?”
- People, the staff: Another question that must be asked, she said, is “What kind of staffing can we afford? … Do you have staff for a 300-people church but only have 30 people?”
- Program: Has the remnant congregation inherited a program – like a preschool – that has to be kept going or ended?
- Structure: How big is the session and how big does it need to be?
- Vision: “It really boils down to whether they are going to hold on,” she said, “or are they going to do anything brand new?”
“The major message,” Philbrick said, “is that we never know what will be able to happen, but if God captures some people’s hearts and minds, it is amazing what they will do and be able to do.”